After the Sims[280] and Burns[281] cases, in which the court-houses were again used in the place of jails, the heat of public indignation led to petitions to the legislature asking for a more stringent personal liberty law. A joint committee prepared a bill, which was passed, but was vetoed by Governor Gardner, who had been advised by the Attorney General that some of the clauses were unconstitutional. But so strong was the influence in its favor that it was passed over the veto by a two-thirds vote.[282] The feeling that it was probably unconstitutional, however, must have strengthened in the next three years: for in 1858[283] we find another act which amended the act of 1855. This limited some provisions, and repealed the following sections: the tenth, which required that any person who should give a certificate that a person claimed as a fugitive was a slave should forfeit any State office he might hold; the eleventh, which forbade any person acting as attorney for a claimant to appear as counsel or attorney in the State courts; the twelfth, which made a violation of the preceding section sufficient ground for the impeachment of any officer of the Commonwealth; the thirteenth, which forbade any United States officer empowered to give certificate or issue warrants from holding a State office; and the fourteenth, which made liable to removal any person holding a State judicial office who should also hold the office of Commissioner.
Review of the Acts by States.
§ 82. Review of the acts by States.—Of the other New England States, Maine had no personal liberty law until 1855.[284] Two years after, however, in 1857,[285] a portion of an act declaring free all slaves brought by their masters into that State was devoted to a provision "to punish any attempt to exercise authority over them."
In New Hampshire, one of the laws of 1857[286] enacted that every person holding any person as a slave for any length of time, under any pretence, should be deemed guilty of felony; but provided that this should not apply to United States officers executing any legal process.
Vermont, by an act in 1840,[287] extended to fugitives the right of trial by jury, but after three years this was repealed,[288] only to be renewed in 1850.[289]
Connecticut, as has been noticed, had no personal liberty law. Rhode Island first passed such an act in 1848.[290] This forbade State officers to take cognizance of fugitive slave cases, and the use of State jails. Another statute, in 1854,[291] extended these provisions so as to apply to the national law of 1850.
The act of 1840 was the only Personal Liberty Law of New York.[292] Pennsylvania, some seven years later, forbade the use of jails, and punished State officers for participating in fugitive slave cases.[293] It also enacted a regulation of the same character as late as 1860.
Ohio made but one provision on the subject, and that lasted but a year. Her jails were closed to suspected slaves in 1857,[294] but in 1858 this law was repealed.[295]
Michigan passed such an act in 1855,[296] with the usual clauses on the use of jails and jury trial, and imposed a fine on false testimony against the defendant.
In 1858 Wisconsin and Kansas also passed similar acts.[297]